Collaboration - Competency
Definition: Collaboration is the process of fostering open communication, building trust-based relationships, and promoting a cooperative environment where information is shared freely and all team members contribute to shared goals. It involves active participation, consensus-building, and shared decision-making, ensuring diverse perspectives are valued while addressing challenges through teamwork and problem-solving. Strong collaboration is rooted in mutual respect, commitment, and the effective use of digital tools to enhance efficiency, minimize misunderstandings, and create a culture of transparency and innovation.
360-Feedback Assessments Measuring Collaboration:
Survey 1 (4-point scale; Competency Comments)
Survey 2 (4-point scale; Competency Comments)
Survey 3 (5-point scale; Competency Comments)
Survey 4 (5-point scale; radio buttons)
Survey 5 (4-point scale; words)
Survey 6 (4-point scale; words)
Survey 7 (5-point scale; competency comments; N/A)
Survey 8 (3-point scale; Agree/Disagree words; N/A)
Survey 9 (3-point scale; Strength/Development; N/A)
Survey 10 (Comment boxes only)
Survey 11 (Single rating per competency)
Survey 12 (Slide-bar scale)
Survey 13 (4-point scale; numbers; floating anchors)
Survey 14 (4-point scale; N/A)
Self-Comments: Do you have to complete a self-assessment or performance appraisal? If so, the
self-comments here may help.
What is Collaboration?
Collaboration means partnering with others to reach a common objective or tackle a shared issue. It encompasses collective decision-making to achieve agreement, sharing information, and appreciating feedback. Successful collaboration relies on reducing conflicts, working together towards a unified effort, and being dedicated to active participation, mutual respect, and fostering trust. Why is Collaboration important?
Collaboration is a key driver of business success by enabling individuals with diverse skills and perspectives to work together to generate innovative solutions; increasing efficiency by leveraging the strengths of each team member; improving decision-making through a broader range of input, leading to more informed decisions; and enhancing engagement and satisfaction through an environment that fosters a sense of community and belonging. How can I improve Collaboration skills?
- Maintain open communication: Communication is critical to success at work. Focus on active listening and clear, concise expression of ideas. Practice empathy and non-verbal communication to enhance your understanding and connection with others.
- Building Relationships: Collaborating with various departments and organizations ensures access to essential resources for success.
- Create a Collaborative environment: Prioritize trust, respect, and the sharing of ideas over competition, fostering innovation and productivity. Emphasize the importance of diverse perspectives, teamwork, and leading by example to create a culture of collaboration and employee satisfaction.
- Information Exchange: Foster an environment where information, insights, and resources are freely shared to enhance efficiency, collaboration, and problem-solving.
- Manage Conflict: Approach interpersonal issues with a collaborative and positive mindset, encouraging teammates to resolve conflicts constructively and work together. Facilitate reconciliation and teamwork to strengthen team unity and effectively manage disputes.
What are the benefits of good Collaboration?
- Maintain open communication: Fostering an environment where open, transparent dialogue is encouraged, and team members feel safe to share ideas and concerns without fear of judgment. This promotes active participation and the free exchange of knowledge and information throughout the organization.
- Building Relationships: This enhances communication, reduces misunderstandings, and fosters a more cohesive work environment. By developing strong partnerships and networks both within and outside the organization, teams can leverage diverse perspectives and resources to achieve better outcomes and drive innovation.
- Create a Collaborative environment: Fostering a collaborative environment is beneficial because it builds trust, encourages innovation, and enhances productivity by valuing diverse perspectives and promoting teamwork. This approach not only drives employee satisfaction but also creates a culture where ideas can flourish and conflicts are resolved constructively.
- Information Exchange: Sharing information for collaborative purposes creates an environment of transparency and efficiency, ensuring that all team members have access to relevant data and insights. This practice enhances problem-solving, accelerates success, and promotes deeper understanding by pooling knowledge and resources.
- Manage Conflict: Effectively managing conflicts fosters a positive work environment, enhancing team collaboration and productivity. This approach not only strengthens relationships and trust among team members but also drives innovation and better business outcomes.
What questions could be included on a 360-degree survey that measure collaboration?
The questionnaire items below will measure collaboration. These questions are grouped into different facets of collaboration. When creating a 360-degree or other performance assessment, try to select one or two items from each group. Questions to include on your survey.
CommunicationCommunication focuses on creating an open, transparent, and supportive dialogue where individuals feel safe to express ideas, concerns, and insights. This dimension highlights fostering trust, enabling participation, promoting discussion across teams, and ensuring that communication flows smoothly to facilitate collaboration. It prioritizes clarity and engagement, ensuring that individuals actively contribute to conversations and exchange perspectives.
- Creates an environment of open and transparent communication.
- Creates an environment where team members feel safe to express their ideas and concerns without fear of judgment.
- Encourages open communication to support a collaborative environment.
- Encourages open dialog and sharing of information among team members.
- Promotes open participation and communication within department and throughout the organization.
- Creates an environment where others feel comfortable sharing knowledge and information.
- Shares concerns and issues with others in the group.
RelationshipsRelationships focuses on building and maintaining strong interpersonal and professional connections to enhance collaboration across teams, departments, and external partnerships. This dimension highlights fostering trust with suppliers, developing alliances within the company, strengthening cross-departmental bonds, and ensuring effective communication to reduce misunderstandings. It prioritizes network-building and trust, ensuring that collaboration is rooted in strong, lasting professional relationships.
- Is comfortable working with employees from different departments/divisions.
- Builds relationships with suppliers to improve communications and reduce misunderstandings and delays.
- Strengthens relationships with suppliers to improve contract and price negotiation terms.
- Fosters strong collaborative relationships with suppliers.
- Maintains strong relationships with suppliers to ensure quality standards are met.
- Develops networks and builds alliances across departments.
- Identifies and organizes partnerships and alliances.
- Builds strong interpersonal relationships for more effective collaboration.
- Collaborates across departmental boundaries and finds common ground with a wide range of stakeholders.
- Develops networks and builds alliances with employees throughout the company.
- Builds strong partnerships with others.
- Meets with appropriate counterparts in negotiations as needed.
- Provides training and support for relationship building in the team.
Collaborative EnvironmentCollaborative Environment focuses on building a workplace culture that encourages teamwork, trust, and shared success. This dimension highlights creating a non-competitive atmosphere, fostering innovation through collaboration, promoting open participation, and modeling cooperative behavior. It prioritizes cultural reinforcement and organizational alignment, ensuring that teamwork is a core value embedded in the departmentâs structure and vision.
- Creates a culture that fosters and values collaboration.
- Builds an environment of trust and respect to encourage risk-taking, innovation, and sharing of ideas.
- Avoids promoting a hyper competitive culture in favor of a more collaborative one.
- Creates a culture that encourages understanding and valuing diverse perspectives to effectively resolve conflicts.
- Promotes a culture of collaboration rather than rivalry.
- Models collaborative behavior through leading by example.
- Cultivates a collaborative culture that drives innovation, productivity, and employee satisfaction.
- Clearly articulates the importance of collaboration in the department's values and vision.
- Create an environment where collaboration and teamwork is encouraged.
Information SharingInformation Sharing emphasizes providing access to relevant knowledge, pooling resources, and ensuring that valuable insights are shared freely among team members to enhance efficiency and decision-making. This dimension centers on distributing critical data, making resources available, and ensuring collaboration results in deeper understanding. It prioritizes accessibility and collective intelligence, ensuring that teams work together to leverage shared knowledge for better outcomes.
- Works with others to pool knowledge, ideas and resources to provide deeper insights into difficult issues.
- Creates an environment to support free exchange of information.
- Shares insights, innovations, and resources to enhance efficiency.
- Shares knowledge, ideas and resources to achieve quicker success.
- Ensures relevant data is available to all committee members.
- Readily shares information with other group members.
- Creates an environment that encourages information sharing.
- Works with others to share knowledge and information.
- Shares information with others.
Open to InputOpen to Input emphasizes actively seeking and valuing contributions from individuals, ensuring diverse perspectives are heard and considered. This dimension centers on listening to ideas, encouraging creative input, implementing feedback, and recognizing the collective strength of varied viewpoints. It prioritizes engagement and inclusivity, ensuring that employees feel empowered to voice suggestions and influence decision-making.
- Open to feedback and willing to share insights to foster a collaborative work environment where everyone feels empowered to contribute.
- Regularly seeks feedback from employees on how to improve collaboration and acts on their suggestions.
- Listens and attends to the ideas from others.
- Seeks continuous improvement through the input from coworkers and staff.
- Listens to the ideas and suggestions from others.
- Gives consideration to the innovative ideas presented by others.
- Is open to unique and creative ideas from others.
- Values the diverse perspectives and skills each team member brings to the table, recognizing that collaborative efforts often lead to more innovative and effective solutions.
- Encourages team members to offer opinions and ideas.
Shared Decision MakingShared Decision Making focuses on bringing multiple stakeholders together to contribute their expertise, viewpoints, and insights to reach a well-rounded decision. This dimension highlights inclusive decision-making processes, valuing diverse opinions, and ensuring that choices are informed by a broad range of perspectives. It prioritizes group consensus and stakeholder involvement, ensuring that decisions are well-informed and mutually supported.
- Values others in decision making.
- Includes all stakeholders in the decision making process.
- Makes decisions with other members of the group.
- Collaborates in group decision making.
- Uses group decision making.
- Allows various stakeholders to contribute their expertise in the decision making process.
- Places value on the views of others in decision making.
ConsensusConsensus emphasizes aligning perspectives, building agreement among stakeholders, and ensuring all voices contribute to cohesive decision-making. This dimension centers on maintaining motivation within teams, prioritizing shared interests, and structuring discussions to reach collective agreement. It prioritizes alignment and unity, ensuring that decisions are made in a way that reflects the input and endorsement of all involved.
- Builds consensus among partners.
- Ensures that all members are aligned and motivated, contributing to a cohesive and productive team dynamic.
- Builds consensus among team members.
- Keeps everyone aligned and motivated to maintain a cohesive and productive team.
- Engages in consensus-building activities.
- Involves others in reaching a consensus during group activities.
- Identifies and prioritizes needs based on shared interests.
Shared GoalsShared Goals emphasizes aligning team members around common objectives, ensuring that everyone understands and contributes toward collective achievements. This dimension centers on defining and communicating goals, motivating teams to work in unity, ensuring alignment in committee-driven efforts, and fostering a shared vision. It prioritizes goal alignment and collective action, ensuring that individuals coordinate efforts effectively to reach agreed-upon outcomes.
- Encourages working together to achieve shared goals.
- Collaborates with team members to achieve common goals.
- Defines shared goals with the committee members.
- Works with others to achieve common objectives.
- Ensures all team members understand the goals.
- Works to obtain a shared vision for goals and objectives of the team.
Shared Problem SolvingShared Problem Solving emphasizes actively working with colleagues to identify, analyze, and resolve challenges collaboratively. This dimension centers on fostering creativity, mutual inspiration, leveraging collective expertise, and developing strategic solutions in a cooperative environment. It prioritizes collaborative brainstorming and solution-building, ensuring that teamwork leads to innovative and effective resolutions.
- Fosters a collaborative work environment where mutual inspiration leads to innovative problem-solving.
- Effectively works with others to create solutions to problems.
- Allows various stakeholders to contribute their expertise to the solution of a problem.
- Willing to work with others to solve problems.
- Works with other experts to solve problems.
- Promotes a culture of collaboration, shared inspiration and creativity to tackle workplace problems.
- Understands that collaboration often leads to more innovative and effective solutions.
- Works with others to develop strategies to identify needs and priorities.
- Actively seeks opportunities to work with colleagues to address and resolve challenges.
CooperationCooperation focuses on actively engaging with team members, fostering a collaborative atmosphere, and working together toward common goals. This dimension highlights strengthening relationships, encouraging teamwork over competition, and ensuring individuals work harmoniously to achieve shared objectives. It prioritizes relationship-building and teamwork, ensuring that individuals collaborate effectively without necessarily requiring full agreement on every decision.
- Fosters a cooperative environment rather than a highly competitive one.
- Gains the cooperation of others to accomplish common goals and objectives.
- Actively engages with team members to foster a cooperative environment.
- Builds and strengthens relationships to improve collaboration and leadership.
- Works cooperatively with others to solve problems.
Conflict ManagementConflict Management focuses on actively addressing and resolving disputes constructively to maintain team unity and productivity. This dimension highlights working collaboratively to handle interpersonal challenges, encouraging positive resolutions, and guiding team members to reconcile differences in a way that strengthens relationships. It prioritizes problem-solving and resolution, ensuring that conflicts do not disrupt collaboration but instead foster better understanding and cooperation.
- Facilitates resolving differences to strengthen team unity.
- Encourages teammates to settle their differences and work together.
- Guides team members to reconcile their differences and collaborate effectively.
- Collaborates with others to resolve conflicts constructively.
- Addresses interpersonal issues with a collaborative mindset.
- Engages in teamwork to handle disputes positively.
- Collaborates to manage interpersonal disputes with a positive approach.
- Works with others to manage conflicts using a constructive approach.
- Works with others to resolve differences.
ContributionContribution focuses on actively providing expertise, resources, and knowledge to support the team and drive solutions forward. This dimension highlights consulting with others, sharing insights, encouraging diverse perspectives, and rewarding the efforts of teammates. It prioritizes value-add and impact, ensuring that individual contributions meaningfully advance team objectives.
- Works with others to resolve issues facing the company.
- Recognizes and rewards the contributions of team members.
- Contributes expertise, insights, and resources to accelerate solutions to problems.
- Contributes resources and knowledge to help the team achieve its goals.
- Contributes resources and knowledge to support others' success.
- Devotes time and energy to empower the team to succeed.
- Consults with other partners on issues.
- Encourages diversity of opinions and ideas.
- Rewards collaborative efforts of team members.
ParticipatesParticipates emphasizes actively engaging in teamwork, decision-making, and discussions to maintain a collaborative and dynamic environment. This dimension centers on joining committees, collaborating in meetings, offering time and effort toward shared success, and fostering an inclusive team culture. It prioritizes engagement and involvement, ensuring that individuals are fully immersed in collaborative efforts.
- Works to create innovative ideas from the collaboration with others.
- Collaborates in time, effort, and expertise to help achieve success.
- Shares skills and time to help the team thrive.
- Participates in the team's deliberations.
- Engages with team members to build a collaborative work environment.
- Participates in collaborative/team decision-making.
- Participates on committees and working groups.
CommitmentCommitment focuses on actively fostering a collaborative environment where individuals are dedicated to teamwork and achieving common goals. This dimension highlights encouraging cross-departmental collaboration, securing engagement from team members, promoting teamwork as a core value, and ensuring long-term dedication to shared objectives. It prioritizes engagement and buy-in, ensuring that individuals actively contribute to a culture of cooperation.
- Uses effective strategies to re-engage team members and secure their commitment to the business's common good.
- Encourages collaboration with other departments.
- Works to get buy-in of individuals based on common good of business.
- Fosters a collaborative work environment where everyone feels committed to achieve common goals.
- Encourages collaboration of fellow employees to achieve results.
- Committed to fostering a collaborative work environment in the department.
- Encourages, promotes and rewards collaboration for improved performance.
TrustTrust emphasizes establishing credibility, mutual respect, and confidence among colleagues to create a dependable and supportive work environment. This dimension centers on building reliability, encouraging transparency, fostering respect, and ensuring team members feel safe in expressing ideas and opinions. It prioritizes integrity and reliability, ensuring that collaboration is rooted in honesty and trustworthiness.
- Has the confidence and trust of other partners.
- Is a trustworthy and credible partner.
- Builds a culture of trust and mutual respect where team members are encouraged to value each other's contributions.
- Is a dependable partner in the group.
- Displays a high degree of trust and credibility.
- Encourages trust among committee members.
- Has the confidence and trust of other team members.
- Is honest with others.
RespectRespect emphasizes valuing diverse perspectives, showing compassion, and maintaining a considerate approach in interactions. This dimension centers on being tactful in discussions, recognizing individual differences, fostering inclusivity, and ensuring that all team members feel heard and valued. It prioritizes mutual understanding and inclusivity, ensuring that individuals respect and acknowledge the contributions of others, even when disagreements arise.
- Respectful of others in group discussions.
- Respects and utilizes diverse perspectives in addressing challenges.
- Views others as valued partners.
- Considers the views of other colleagues and associates.
- Respects other committee members.
- Respects other group/team members.
- Respects individual differences that contribute to solving problems.
- Is tactful, compassionate and sensitive to the needs of others.
- Is respectful of others in group discussions.
- Recognizes and understands the views of other partners and associates.
TechnologyTechnology focuses on utilizing digital tools and platforms to facilitate collaboration, streamline workflows, and enhance document creation processes. This dimension highlights integrating technology in research and development, policy documentation, and department-wide cooperation. It prioritizes efficiency and digital enablement, ensuring that collaborative efforts are optimized through the strategic use of digital tools.
- Uses digital tools to support collaborative efforts in document creation?
- Integrates technology to boost collaborative work on process and policy documentation.
- Effectively uses technology to facilitate collaborative efforts in building process and policy documents.
- Equip the team with the right tools and technologies to facilitate collaboration.
- Effectively uses digital tools do you use to improve collaboration in the department.
- Integrates digital tools to streamline the collaborative processes of Research and Development.
- Utilizes digital tools to enhance collaborative efforts in creating process and policy documents.